sdk@oahu.cs.ucla.edu (Scott D Kalter) (06/11/89)
Does anyone know much about the new camera that Canon is advertising? It takes a 3.5 inch floppy and stores pictures on it. The pictures can be viewed by plugging the camera into your television set. This seems like a really neat idea for certain applications. What would be really cool is if the disks could be read by an amiga and the images converted from their format to IFF. It seems they must be able to digitize full color images with "reasonable?" quality fairly quickly. I think this would be an exciting way to get digitized images into the amiga quickly and painlessly especially since it is portable. If you wanted to get digitized images of something like sailing you could just take your camera with you, photograph some scenes directly onto disk. I'd appreciate any information people may have on this. I intend to look around in stores for it locally to see what I can find out. -Scott
phil@eos.UUCP (Phil Stone) (06/12/89)
In article <SDK.89Jun10183056@oahu.cs.ucla.edu> sdk@oahu.cs.ucla.edu (Scott D Kalter) writes:
<Does anyone know much about the new camera that Canon is advertising?
<It takes a 3.5 inch floppy and stores pictures on it. The pictures
<can be viewed by plugging the camera into your television set.
<This seems like a really neat idea for certain applications. What
<would be really cool is if the disks could be read by an amiga and the
<images converted from their format to IFF. It seems they must be able
<to digitize full color images with "reasonable?" quality fairly
<quickly.
I have heard from a trusted source that this camera stores ANALOG images
on the floppy - no digitization is done. My thoughts were the same as
yours until I heard this.
Of course, I could be wrong, and I'm sure I'll hear about it if I am!
Phil Stone (phil@eos.arc.nasa.gov | ames!eos!phil)kent@swrinde.nde.swri.edu (Kent D. Polk) (06/13/89)
In article <3942@eos.UUCP> phil@eos.UUCP (Phil Stone) writes: >In article <SDK.89Jun10183056@oahu.cs.ucla.edu> sdk@oahu.cs.ucla.edu (Scott D Kalter) writes: ><Does anyone know much about the new camera that Canon is advertising? ><It takes a 3.5 inch floppy and stores pictures on it. The pictures [...] >I have heard from a trusted source that this camera stores ANALOG images >on the floppy - no digitization is done. My thoughts were the same as [...] Kodak brought their new system for us to look at a couple of months ago. It uses 3" disks I believe. From the info the salesman presented, (He didn't understand my questions), I figured that it has to be stored analog also. They have a pretty neat system - complete with modem picture transfer & fancy software for a PC. Told him they ought to have it hooked to an Amiga. He didn't know what an Amiga was either. Kent Polk
mikes@lakesys.UUCP (Mike Shawaluk) (06/13/89)
In article <17367@swrinde.nde.swri.edu> kent@swrinde.UUCP (Kent D. Polk) writes: >In article <3942@eos.UUCP> phil@eos.UUCP (Phil Stone) writes: >>I have heard from a trusted source that this camera stores ANALOG images >>on the floppy - no digitization is done. My thoughts were the same as >[...] >Kodak brought their new system for us to look at a couple of months ago. >It uses 3" disks I believe. From the info the salesman presented, (He >didn't understand my questions), I figured that it has to be stored >analog also. They have a pretty neat system - complete with modem >picture transfer & fancy software for a PC. Told him they ought to have >it hooked to an Amiga. He didn't know what an Amiga was either. Well, the fact that it stores the images in analog isn't necessarily a total loss, since the original image source is analog; actually, I would venture a guess that the image is stored in a hybrid of analog & digital means. That is, since the image sensor in the camera is a pixel-oriented device, it puts out an "analog" level of the color information for each of its pixel sensors. Maybe this information is stored on the disk, but can still be resolved to the pixel level, but the color & intensity information could be off a bit because of the analog recording & playback. This would be better than pure analog recording, no? (Note: the above conjecture is totally my own; I don't claim to know much about the technology of Still Video recording, as I believe it's called, except for what I've read in a few product liturature blurbs I've seen. One additional note: if the system features "modem picture transfer", as stated above, then some means of digitizing the information [assuming that it's stored in analog form] must exist, since most modems I know about work best with digital data!! Also, the printers that are supplied with these systems [at least the Canon color inkjet one I saw] has a Centronix connector on the back, and looks like it would be a dynamite printer for an Amiga, even without the Still Video camera! I'll post more information about it if anyone is interested.) -- - Mike Shawaluk (mikes@lakesys.lakesys.com OR ...!uunet!marque!lakesys!mikes) "Where were you on the night of August 12?"
ferg@pnet01.cts.com (John Ferguson) (06/13/89)
phil@eos.UUCP (Phil Stone) writes: >In article <SDK.89Jun10183056@oahu.cs.ucla.edu> sdk@oahu.cs.ucla.edu (Scott D Kalter) writes: ><Does anyone know much about the new camera that Canon is advertising? ><It takes a 3.5 inch floppy and stores pictures on it. The pictures ><can be viewed by plugging the camera into your television set. > ><This seems like a really neat idea for certain applications. What ><would be really cool is if the disks could be read by an amiga and the ><images converted from their format to IFF. It seems they must be able ><to digitize full color images with "reasonable?" quality fairly ><quickly. > >I have heard from a trusted source that this camera stores ANALOG images >on the floppy - no digitization is done. My thoughts were the same as >yours until I heard this. > >Of course, I could be wrong, and I'm sure I'll hear about it if I am! > > Phil Stone (phil@eos.arc.nasa.gov | ames!eos!phil) I believe its a 2.5" floppy and not a 3.5" So making an Amiga read a Cannon disk would require a few hardware "enhancements" :) ____ |_ | erg US Mail: P.O. Box 2104, La Mesa CA, 92044 Voice: (619) 670-3161 Modem: (619) 670-1095 ARPA: crash!pnet01!ferg@nosc.mil INET: ferg@pnet01.cts.com -=[ In Stereo Where Available ]=-
chiodo@ihlpb.ATT.COM (Chiodo) (06/15/89)
Check out "Compute's Amiga Resource" Summer edition for a complete article on the Amiga and the Canon Zapshot. The article was written by an amigaite whom happens to be in the marketing department. I saw this and Sony's equivalent at the CES show here in Chicago they were impressive. They both store 50 pictures on a small small 2" floppy of course they can be erased and fed directly into any NTSC compatable device. The camera is small and protable and Canons has a built in self contained playback system (sony's come in 2 parts the camera and a base unit). More on this later. I'm not a camera nut but here are some specs from the magazine (I have not gotten the literature yet): Built in flash. 11mm f2.8 Canon lens (equivalent to a 60mm lens on a 35mm camera). Macro setting on lens for closeups. Rechargeable lead-acid battery yeilds up to 800 shots in daylight Built in playback capabilities. The magazine also says "Zapshot picture quality is impressive, especially when displayed on a TV monitor. Howedver, in order to get 50 images on a disk, Zapshot records in the field mode, which limits the quality of the digitized image to medium-resolution parameters with the framegrabber". The price is about $800 and the article went on to say units that store two field per picture (better quaility cost considerably more...remember this is a consumer product. The Mavica MVC-C1 (Sony's version) has the EXACT same specs I was told at the Sony booth. There are differences in design: Sony's has 2 units, camera and base. Built in flash The camera has NO playback capability and the diskdrive is motorized (like on the MAC but with a button), Canon uses a flip top entry. Sony's require the base unit to display the images, you can them delete pictures from this base (not sure if canon can do this but it might). Sony's has a "continuous" button. Holding this button down will shoot 9 frames a second (not bad!!). Canon does not have this. Sony's base unit has a battery recharger and recharges the battery in the camera when hooked up. I beleive the price competetive. Oh well this is getting long ...... they were both impressive and I should get the literature soon, Send me Email if anyone is further interested. I am not affiliated with any of the companies mentioned above. John Chiodo att!ihlpb!chiodo